You’ve got the water boiling and salted. The spaghetti’s ready to drop into the pot. The sauce is simmering away in the saucepan. The kitchen smells like garlic and basil, wine is poured. Hunger is mounting.

And yet a question looms: exactly how much sauce should you ladle onto each portion?

Too little and you’ve got dry, sad pasta that no amount of grated cheese can salvage. Too much and you’re basically serving soup with pasta garnish. Let’s nail this down once and for all with some practical advice that will serve you through countless pasta nights.

Make This Basic Formula Your Starting Point

For most everyday situations, aim for about 1/4 cup (2 ounces) of sauce per 2 ounces of dry pasta per person. This ratio has stood the test of time in home kitchens across Italy and beyond. It’s the Goldilocks zone — not too much, not too little — but remember, this is just a starting point.

Pasta is deeply personal, and so is the way you sauce it. Some people (myself included on certain days) might prefer their pasta a bit more generously dressed, while others prefer to taste more of the pasta itself with just a light coating of sauce. The beauty of cooking at home is that you get to decide.

Not All Pastas Are Sauced Equal

Different pasta shapes demand different amounts of sauce. A strand of spaghetti, for instance, has vastly different sauce-holding capabilities than a piece of fusilli.

When in doubt, reference my rules of thumb:

Long, thin pasta (spaghetti, linguine, bucatini): 2-3 tablespoons per serving. These slender strands need just enough sauce to coat each one without overwhelming. Too much sauce will slide right off and pool at the bottom of your plate. The sauce should cling to the pasta in a thin, even layer that enhances rather than masks the pasta’s texture.

Flat ribbons (fettuccine, pappardelle, tagliatelle): 3-4 tablespoons per serving. Their wider surface area demands more coverage. Each ribbon should have sauce on both sides, and the wider the noodle, the more sauce it can handle. This is why fettuccine Alfredo works so beautifully — those wide noodles carry the rich sauce perfectly.

Tubes (penne, rigatoni, ziti): 4-5 tablespoons per serving. The goal here is getting sauce both inside and outside each piece. Those hollow centers aren’t just for show — they’re sauce vehicles designed to deliver flavor in every bite. A slightly thicker sauce works well here, as it can cling to both the inside and outside surfaces.

Shapes with crevices (fusilli, farfalle, radiatori): 4-5 tablespoons per serving. Those twists, folds, and ridges are ingenious sauce traps that hold more sauce per bite. This is why these shapes pair so well with chunkier sauces — those bits of vegetable or meat get caught in the pasta’s architecture, creating perfect bites.

Stuffed pasta (ravioli, tortellini, agnolotti): 3-4 tablespoons per serving. These pastas are already carrying flavor inside their pockets, so the sauce should complement rather than compete. Go lighter here, using sauce as an enhancement rather than the main event. A simple butter sauce or light tomato sauce is often all you need.

The Sauce Type Matters Too

The viscosity and makeup of your sauce significantly affects how much you should use:

Oil-based sauces (aglio e olio, pesto, simple olive oil sauces): Use about 25% less than the standard recommendation. These sauces spread more efficiently and coat pasta more readily than thicker options. A little goes a surprisingly long way, especially with good quality olive oil as your base.

Tomato sauces: The standard amounts above work perfectly here. Whether you’re making a simple marinara or a more complex arrabbiata, tomato sauces have the ideal consistency to cling to pasta without being too heavy or too runny.

Cream-based sauces (Alfredo, carbonara): Often 2-3 tablespoons is plenty—they’re rich and coat exceptionally well due to their fat content. These sauces tend to be quite rich, so a little restraint goes a long way. They also thicken as they cool, so what might seem like too little sauce at first may be perfect once tossed.

Chunky meat sauces (Bolognese, ragu): May need up to 1/3 cup per serving to ensure everyone gets enough meat distributed throughout their portion. The chunks of meat and vegetables need extra volume to distribute evenly, and these hearty sauces are often the star of the dish.

Your Built-in Measuring Cup

Not interested in dirtying measuring cups and spoons?

Here’s a trick I’ve used for decades: cup your palm slightly. The amount of sauce that fits in that natural depression is roughly right for one generous portion of pasta.

It’s simple, built-in portion control that Italian grandmothers have relied on for generations. Your hand is always with you, making this the most convenient measuring device in your kitchen.

Cooking for the Family? Plan for Seconds

When serving pasta family-style in a large bowl at the table, scale up your sauce by about 25% from what you’d use for plated individual servings.

There are several reasons for this: people inevitably take seconds, sauce settles and gets absorbed into the pasta as it sits, and nobody wants the last serving to be dry and sauce-deprived. This extra insurance policy ensures that every serving, from first to last, has the perfect amount of sauce.

Let Pasta Water Be Your Secret

Always, always reserve a cup of pasta cooking water before draining. This starchy liquid is perhaps the most underrated ingredient in pasta cookery. A tablespoon or two tossed with your pasta and sauce creates the perfect emulsion that helps sauce adhere to pasta instead of slipping off.

If you’ve accidentally under-sauced your pasta, a splash of this liquid gold can save the day, stretching your sauce while improving its texture. In many traditional Italian recipes, pasta water is not optional — it’s essential to creating the right consistency.